St Finbarr's v Nemo Rangers: Star forward Luke Connolly embracing captaincy

LUKE Connolly might be forgiven if he feels that his achievement in captaining Nemo Rangers in tomorrow’s Bons Secours Hospital Cork Premier SFC final isn’t receiving due attention at home.

The 29-year-old attacker will seek to lead Nemo to a 23rd title and a perfect way of marking the club’s centenary, but even that – potentially his fifth medal – is likely to be overshadowed by his sister Megan’s travel plans next summer.

Megan is a professional footballer for Brighton & Hove Albion and the Republic of Ireland and she will be heading to the World Cup in Australia and New Zealand. All going well, Luke hopes to be there as a supporter.

“I was chatting to my fiancée Emma and we were trying to work out from a financial standpoint if it was even possible,” he says.

“We’re getting married next year and there are things going on, so budgets are getting tightened!

Seeing Megan reach a World Cup, it’s the pinnacle of any career and it’s certainly something I’d do my utmost to see.”

That’s for 2023 and more pressing is the challenge of St Finbarr’s in Páirc Uí Chaoimh tomorrow. Luke, a Heineken sales representative, acknowledges that Nemo’s 100th birthday is a driving factor, as well as the fact that the Trabeg club are keen to atone for a 2021 campaign that never got going, beginning just a week after they had won the 2020 title.

“Up until now, I’d have said it was just another year,” he says, “but I know you’re not naïve enough to think that I’m telling the truth when I say that!

“Obviously, the dream would be to lift the county in the centenary year as captain of the club. It would be an ideal scenario and obviously there is a lot riding on it.

“The other side of it is that, after the year we had last year, I’d say there would be a lot of pressure on anyway to get back to where we thought this group should be. We went from back-to-back county championships to being knocked out in the group stages without really laying a glove on anyone.”

“You could argue that the scheduling didn’t help but I don’t want to use that as an excuse.

“One thing is that, from a physical standpoint, we were nowhere near where we wanted to be going into a season – that was because we came out of the lockdown with a county final to prepare for and you would have sacrified a lot of your S&C work and gym work for tatical work and wanting to be match-sharp and prioritising game-specific stuff.

“There was a period where we didn’t know if the game was going to be on in two weeks’ time or six weeks’ time and so we lost a bit of our pre-season work for want of winning a county final.”

Goalkeeper Micheál Aodh Martin was the man to get his hands on the Andy Scannell Cup after that win over Castlehaven and this year Connolly was the one chosen by manager Paul O’Donovan to succeed him.

“The Sciath na Scol was probably the last one I got my hands on as a captain!” he laughs.

“I was chatting to Paulo only recently and the two of us laughed about it and said he should maybe have made me captain a lot sooner because I seem to be

doing a lot less of the crazy stuff and a lot more of the sensible stuff on the pitch.

“To be honest, I couldn’t believe he asked me and I’m forever grateful to be given the chance to join the list of great captains in this club. It’s an incredibly easy group to captain – there are enough past captains still playing so there are leaders all over the place.”

NATURAL

The ‘crazy stuff’ as he puts it is more down to decision-making rather than trying to curb the natural talent that is all too rare in Cork.

“Paul has always said to play the way I’ve always played,” Connolly says, “but I suppose there are times where you need to be more reasonable – you’ve had three wides in a row, this isn’t the time for Luke to try one with the outside of the left.

“I can’t be saying to a fella, ‘Don’t be taking on X type of shot,’ if I’m doing it a minute later.

“It has probably helped me focus the mind better in terms of decision-making, but the other side is that it hasn’t hampered me in terms of trying stuff – which, again, can be risky!”
Certainly, Nemo have had to be patient in games against Clonakilty, Carbery Rangers and Ballincollig, where tough defences took times to break down.

“There are different ways of interpreting things,” Connolly says.

We’ve been able to play different types of games and come out on the right side of all of them.

“We lost two games last year that we won this year – against Clon, we had 10 or 12 wides in the first half alone and in years gone by, we’d have lost that game as frustration would have got the better of us.

“This year, we’re probably better at handling that frustration but also getting through and being resolute.

“The other side of it too is that we only coughed up eight points against Clon and nine against Ross. From a defensive standpoint, huge credit has to go to Micheál and the six lads and the midfield.”

They will be tested again by the Barrs. Connolly won the Corn Uí Mhuirí with Coláiste Chríost Rí in 2011 alongside John Kerins, Eoghan Finn and Eoin McGreevey and the following year he was part of the last Nemo side to lose to the Togher side in the championship.

Since then, Nemo have had the Indian sign – does that count for anything?

“We’d like to think it does,” he says.

“Obviously, there was the drawn county final and replay in 2017 and then the quarter-final in 2019, when they were county champions.

“You’d like to think that something like that would play on their minds and people say they’ve never beaten us in a county final – I’ve only ever played them in one county final so it’s not really a fair barometer to base it on.

“I just think it’s going to be two very good teams who are absolutely terrified of losing to each other.”